Catch Me
by Fearful Crimson
Summary: It’s the end of Rory’s last year at Yale, and she is ready to let loose after all this time. She goes out on a girls night and finds herself calling someone unexpected. Rory and Jess.


**Summary**: It's the end of Rory's last year at Yale, and she is ready to let loose after all this time. She goes out on a girls night and finds herself calling someone unexpected. Rory and Jess.

**Disclaimer**: I don't own the characters or anything. I'm just having some fun writing some stories about them.

--

Saturday

Rory Gilmore knocked on her best friend, Lane's door, as hard as she could, nonstop until Zach finally answered. "Is Lane here?" Rory asked, sounding exasperated.

Zach looked confused, and looked around. His hair was messy, and it looked like he'd just been sleeping... Which was a surprise, considering it was 2 in the afternoon. "She's uh... I actually don't know, but she's here somewhere."

"Y'Know what Zach? I'll just find her myself, 'kay?" Rory replied, trying to make it easier on him. "You just... go back to whatever you were doing." Zach moved aside and she stepped in, looking for Lane. She noticed how quiet it was, and decided this was the right place for her to come. Anywhere else would have been torture. She had to study for her finals _somewhere_.

Lane was on one of her cleaning sprees again, and had her yellow rubber gloves on, and was rigorously scrubbing at the stove. Standing there for a moment, Rory tried to figure out how to ask her if she could study there. It wasn't her house, or anything, but whenever she was at Lane's house, she felt like it was home. "Hey, Lane?" She called out from the other end of the room, interrupting all the scrubbing going on.

Lane jumped and turned to face Rory. "Hey! What brings you here?"

Rory just showed her the bag of schoolwork and books and said, "Finals."

"Say no more," Lane said lightly, and steered Rory into the livingroom, but found Zach sitting on the couch watching some band interview. "Um..." Lane paused, and then started toward her room. "Here, you can study in here. I doubt I'll be needing my room anytime soon. Plus, Zach's all sucked into the TV right now, anyway."

"Thanks," Rory said gratefully, and sat down at Lane's desk, arranging her books and starting to study, as Lane closed her door.

About two hours later, Rory groaned, "Oh, my God! These finals are going to drive me _crazy_!"

She heard her phone ring and answered it in a hurry. She wasn't up for anymore interruptions.

This studying portion had to be done _tonight_, and she wasn't about to let anyone pull her away from it. "Hello?" Rory finally answered and tried to read while also concentrate on whoever was calling. She'd been too frazzled to check the Caller I.D. and see who it was.

"Hey kid," She heard her mother, Lorelai say on the other end.

"What?" Rory asked, more harsh than she had actually wanted to sound. Sometimes it seemed like the only two friends she had were Lane and her mother.

"Jeez, relax I'm just calling to see how you are." Lorelai sounded defensive on the other line.

Sighing, Rory answered, "S-Sorry. I'm just stressed from these exams that are coming up, is all. So if I become a little tense, you'll know why." She played with a loose thread from Lane's bed as she waited for her mom's response.

Lorelai didn't even know that Rory was in Stars Hollow, because Lane's was the first place she'd thought to come. Her own house would be too familiar to study. Plus, Lorelai would be bothering her every minute asking if she would be willing to go somewhere. Luke was out of town again with his daughter. Some field trip, but Rory didn't really know the facts, so Lorelai got bored. Apparently, Rory couldn't even get away from the madness when she wasn't even around it.

Her own place was too crazy to even think about studying in. Paris was on another one of those psychotic rambling sprees. Then again, when _wasn't_ she?

"Hmm, I wanted to see if you wanted to do something tonight, but you're obviously sucked up in your interesting college books. You'd obviously rather hang out with _them_ than me. Hmph," Lorelai responded stubbornly.

Rolling her eyes, Rory gave her books a questionable look. "They're not _interesting_, trust me. These finals are just _really_ important, mom... Oh, and I'm in Stars Hollow, by the way."

"What! You're in Stars Hollow and you don't even bother to come over? Psh, I'm going to disown you soon if you don't make up for this," Lorelai joked.

Rory hated when her mother played the guilt card... She always felt so bad, even if Lorelai was partly joking when she did. Without having to say anything, Lorelai got Rory to give in and she said, "Fine! Okay mom, what do you want to do tonight?"

"Ha! I was thinking getting something to eat at Luke's... even though Luke himself isn't there... But we could laugh at the way the food tastes different." At that moment, Rory just realized that she couldn't wait for Luke to get back from that stupid weekend field trip with April, and get home. Lorelai always complained more when Luke wasn't around, and the food at Luke's usually sucked compared to the normal service.

Rory sighed and looked at her books. She figured that after going to Luke's, they could watch a movie, or something, afterwards, so then she could get in some studying while watching the movie. That was totally against the Gilmore rules, but desperate times called for desperate measures. "Fine," she finally answered, and they decided to meet up at Luke's and go from there.

Clicking her phone shut, Rory thought of how she was going to get in all this studying. Part of her wanted to blame anyone and anything but herself for her excessive need to study and get good grades. It was just how she was, and she couldn't help it. But now it was time to tend to her loving, but sometimes childish, mother.

--

When Rory got to Luke's, she could see her mom was already sitting at the counter. "Rory!" She squealed and gave her daughter a bone-crushing hug.

"Hi?" She answered uncertainly.

"'Kay, let's go."

Furrowing her eyebrows, Rory asked, "But mom, aren't we going to eat?"

"Psh, you know the food sucks when Luke's not here," she said a little too loudly and Caesar looked at her. "C'mon. You know it's true." Right then he gave in and went back to taking someone's order.

Once they were off, no one could stop them. They went to so many places that Rory lost track and even forgot about her studies for awhile.

It was nice to be back in Stars-Hollow.


End file.
